1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a slim mouse as an interface for mobile appliances, and more particularly to a slim mouse and a method for manufacturing the same, wherein the mouse can freely perform X, Y, and Z-direction movements, rotation, and clicking of a cursor on a screen using a distribution of force of a tactile sensor for which it is easy to design to be slim.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently, computer systems employ various types of input units to perform input operations. These operations generally include cursor movement and selection on a display screen and provide functions such as page turning, scrolling, panning, and zooming.
Well-known input units include a button, a switch, a mouse, a trackball, a joystick, etc.
The button and switch are generally mechanical so that they are limited in their control to move the cursor or make selections. For example, the button or switch provides only a function to move the cursor in a specific direction using a key such as an arrow direction key or to make a specific selection using a key such as an enter key, delete key or number key.
When the user moves the mouse along the surface, an input pointer is moved according to the relative movement of the mouse. When the user moves the trackball within the housing, the input pointer is moved according to the relative movement of the trackball. A conventional multifunctional mouse, which provides the input pointer moving function, the selection function and the scroll function based on the position recognition as stated above, requires a relatively wide mouse pad such as a desk or table. As a result, it is difficult to apply the conventional mouse based on the position recognition to mobile devices because the mobile devices are limited in size.
On the other hand, the conventional joystick operates the cursor using force. The conventional joystick is also too thick to be applied to mobile devices which have gradually become slim. The conventional joystick is also limited in its design and development in consideration of a GUI environment.
Therefore, there is a need to develop an input unit, which detects X, Y and Z-direction movements and rotations of the cursor through force-based tactile sensing using a tactile sensor which can be slimmed as shown in FIG. 17, and an algorithm for the detection.